A leading proponent of intelligent design, who was targeted by atheist professors in 2005, has been denied tenure at Iowa State University.

Assistant professor of astronomy and physics Guillermo Gonzalez, co-author of "The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos Is Designed for Discovery," was one of three members of the ISU faculty denied promotion or tenure of the 66 considered during the past academic year, reported the Ames, Iowa, Tribune.

"I was surprised to hear that my tenure was denied at any level, but I was disappointed that the president at the end denied me," Gonzalez said yesterday.

In 2005, three ISU faculty members drafted a statement and petition against intelligent design in the science curriculum that collected 120 signatures.

Claims for intelligent design, said the ISU faculty statement "are premised on (1) the arbitrary selection of features claimed to be engineered by a designer; (2) unverifiable conclusions about the wishes and desires of that designer; and (3) an abandonment by science of methodological naturalism.

"Whether one believes in a creator or not, views regarding a supernatural creator are, by their very nature, claims of religious faith, and so not within the scope or abilities of science. We, therefore, urge all faculty members to uphold the integrity of our university of 'science and technology,' convey to students and the general public the importance of methodological naturalism in science, and reject efforts to portray intelligent design as science."

Similar petitions were published by faculty at the University of Iowa and the University of Northern Iowa.

As an aside, from that same site, has anyone noticed that 'pro-family' seems to mean nothing more than 'anti-gay'?

Yep, fag bashing should solve all the problems of families everywhere.

--------------"Rich is just mad because he thought all titties had fur on them until last week when a shorn transvestite ruined his childhood dreams by jumping out of a spider man cake and man boobing him in the face lips." - Erasmus

Refusing to grant tenure to Guillermo Gonzalez is clearly ideologically/politically motivated. He has at least 55 publications in his field according to ISI Web of Knowledge, which is more than his most vociferous critics have accomplished.

While I'm not expert on Gonzalez's qualifications, my impression is that he should have been given tenure.

Yes, I know, he doesn't sound very convincing on Privileged Planet, but his other ideas are taken seriously in other fora, and he may be right that the best place to look for really old earth rocks is the moon.

I'd give him some trouble over the Privileged Planet nonsense, of course, as it's all too close to the marvel that the cat has holes in its skin where his eyes happen to be. It's like the psychics, retrofitting the facts to be their "predictions", marveling that we can scientifically understand the universe, even though it took a good 4 billion + years for life to get to the stage of scientific understanding.

But he does good work, and I can't see denying him tenure over his manifestly politico-religious positions, at least unless I've seen that the latter affects his actual work. I suppose I'd have to hold my nose to vote tenure for him, yet I think that I would. Now if someone has evidence that his pseudoscientific notions do affect either his teaching or his work, I'd be likely to change my mind.

Should someone who thinks Noah's Ark carved the Grand Canyon be given tenure at a geology department?

As anyone who's been around academia any length of time can tell you, people have been denied tenure for far less.

--------------"Rich is just mad because he thought all titties had fur on them until last week when a shorn transvestite ruined his childhood dreams by jumping out of a spider man cake and man boobing him in the face lips." - Erasmus

Refusing to grant tenure to Guillermo Gonzalez is clearly ideologically/politically motivated. He has at least 55 publications in his field according to ISI Web of Knowledge, which is more than his most vociferous critics have accomplished.

Alas, universities are under no obligation to provide people with secure pulpit from which to preach their religious opinions.

Let him go to the Texas School of Seminary or whatever, with Dr Dr Bill.

So, what was the reason he was denied? I thought that universities in general did not make this public, as it can get in the way of a person applying for a tenure track position elsewhere. Do we know for certain it was for his ID work? Tenure is based on many criteria, including scholarship, teaching effectiveness, and service to one's institution and the greater community.

I find it hilarious that a person who's published nothing (Robert) regularly insults anti-ID people for not publishing enough. It takes a certain really profound lack of self-awareness to do that, which is, of course, why Robert does it well.

Sure people are free to support ID and to think that the Grand Canyon is a few thousand years old. And university faculties are free to reject such beliefs as junk science. Universities are not obliged to have affirmative action programs whereby they have to admit people teaching religiously-based 'science' into their faculties.

--------------"Rich is just mad because he thought all titties had fur on them until last week when a shorn transvestite ruined his childhood dreams by jumping out of a spider man cake and man boobing him in the face lips." - Erasmus

Erm, and unless I'm mistaken (which is possible) it is lithium carbonate NOT the bicarbonate (i.e. lithium hydrogen carbonate) which is used for treatment of bipolar disorder.

Louis

Now, how exactly would you know that?

--------------"Rich is just mad because he thought all titties had fur on them until last week when a shorn transvestite ruined his childhood dreams by jumping out of a spider man cake and man boobing him in the face lips." - Erasmus